I’ve certainly felt my age recently, firstly with a conversation about how “headhunters” aren’t like what they were in my day (a blog on that to follow) and then chatting with Kay Senior of The Needle about how recruiters see services like video interviewing as a cost they’d struggle to pass onto their clients.
I have offered psychometric testing for recruitment to agencies and corporates for more than 15 years and I can tell you that agencies very often don’t believe they can persuade their client to pay another £250 on top of the fees they are charging. Video interviewing is just the same in terms of excuses. Let me tell you this; psychometrics and video interviews are not another cost but an added value service.
Honestly, used correctly, they add value to what you are doing for your client. As a result you have two choices; either absorb the cost yourself or pass it on – with confidence!!
What really makes me shake my head about this is that I remember back in the 90s selling recruitment advertising on a weekly basis to clients, already paying at least a 25% fee. A full page in The Grocer magazine was £1000, a full page advert in Computer Weekly was £35k and if you wanted a quarter page on the front of the Sunday Times Recruitment section it was over £40,000. That’s right, £40,000 for a one off advert which THE CLIENT PAID FOR.
I know that Badenoch & Clark, Scotland have been using video interviewing for 18 months with The Needle and are now using it for 95% of their senior appointments – all retained business. Their clients love it and are asking for more. If you can easily offer a cost effective, value added solution to your clients recruitment process by adding video, why wouldn’t you?
So, please get your shit in order and start recognising the value of these services and what they can do for your client.
